Educational Segregation in the North

This paper is merely an attempt to clarify the issues involved in the establishment of separate schools in certain Northern states. The problem is such an important one that these issues should be faced squarely. That there is a distinct attempt being made in some quarters to exclude Negroes from Northern colleges and universities, no well-informed observer will deny. In the Boston public school system a few 'white teachers, who hardly act on their own initiative, are becoming increasingly bolder in their efforts to discourage colored students from going to the college preparatory high schools and to white colleges. In one school, a separate assembly of colored students was ordered for the purpose of extolling to them the virtues of manual training and of colored schools. Last year the Harvard Medical School refused admission, on the most puerile grounds, to a Harvard graduate of fine appearance, cum laude standing, and general popularity among the white students who were admitted. One New England college, which formerly admitted colored students, denied admission a few years ago to a colored student of the first rank from a high school noted for the fine records of its' graduates in Northern institutions. The coaches on many teams openly discourage potential Negro varsity men, and only a few college presidents have the courage to tell Southem schools either to play against Negroes or to forfeit the game. These examples may probably be multiplied in the Middle West and in the West. I have given only those with which I am personally acquainted., As yet, however, there is no established policy in Northern schools. One may suspect, indeed, that the presidents exchange views; on this knotty problem, either by correspondence or in their annual conference. Meanwhile, each president pursues his own course unless some unusually courageous Negro student or editor makes him hesitate before an enlightenedsometimes even an enraged-board of trustees, faculty, alumni, or other group of influential citizens. At best, it may be said that except by a few splendid college presidents whom it would be invidious to name, Negro students are merely tolerated on the campus. There is, nevertheless, probably no imminent danger that any considerable number of these colleges will exclude all Negroes if Negro leaders are alert to focus public attention upon every attempt at discrimination, and if Negro educators do not themselves demand separate colleges. But it is frankly to be feared that a new generation in which the grandsons of the Jays, the BoWditches, the Higginsons, and the Storeys will have lost either their influence or their keen interest in the Negro will be unable to with

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